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  Love you more than sauce on my tacos. Talk soon.

  Me.

  “Oh, Mom,” I said with a sigh.

  She would hunt him like she’d hunted my father. She would probably never find either of them. Or at least I hoped not. The police would find Brooks. Eventually. I hoped.

  I’d sent emails to my agent and editor already this morning. I was going to get back to work. I was sure they’d be happy to hear I was ready to try. I planned on calling Dr. Genero to talk about some sort of therapy, even virtual therapy if it wasn’t like a sitcom I’d heard about.

  Detective Majors had emailed me about the blanket, but even though her words were positive, I sensed she felt the same way my mother did: frustrated by the dead ends.

  The parolees were all gone. It was just me and Viola this morning. Viola had bought me breakfast at the café. I’d eaten the best pancakes I’d ever tasted. I was already excited to eat them again tomorrow.

  Loretta and Trinity had gone back to Anchorage. I didn’t know what would happen to them, and we made no plans to keep in touch. I really didn’t think Trinity’s hometown of Washington, Missouri, had anything to do with me, but I would keep that fact filed away for a while.

  George and Willa were taken to Juneau with plans to get them back to Detroit. Willa had at least told the truth, in the end. She had come to Benedict to let George and Linda know she still wanted money from them. Linda told her she was tired of living a lie—that really was the letter I’d seen Willa reading.

  Time to come clean. Time to live an honest life. You should live honestly too, Willa. It’s the only way to live.

  In fact, it had been Willa who Linda had been arguing with next to the lodge, but that argument hadn’t been about Willa wanting more money. It had been about the fact that Willa thought Linda shouldn’t have told George that she wanted to come clean, go back to Detroit. Willa thought Linda was in danger, that George wasn’t going to go back without a fight. It had been much worse than a mere fight.

  Gril had gone over to Juneau to question George with the Juneau police. Apparently, George had broken quickly, admitted to killing Linda and making it look like a suicide. The ME and I, and every-damn-one else, according to Gril, had the measurements wrong. If inches had been used instead of centimeters, the police would never have thought Linda killed herself. My grandfather would be mighty impressed by Gril’s tenacity. But he’d be pretty darn angry we’d all missed the obvious. Gramps didn’t like it when the obvious was missed.

  I smiled sadly to myself.

  That was the thing I didn’t see coming, how much all of what had happened to me, in Missouri and here in Alaska, would make me miss my grandfather. Or miss him more than I already did.

  George would face murder charges in two states—Michigan and Alaska. His three strikes would now be four, and the murder of his wife would trump everything. To satisfy everyone’s curiosity, Gril found the baby in Detroit. The expectant mother was, in fact, Linda’s niece. She hadn’t heard from her aunt for a few years and was happy to hear that the baby had given Linda some happy news, but desperately sad about the turn of events.

  Willa was in trouble too, but I didn’t know how much. I was still impressed by her ability to hide in plain sight. I was doing the same, though I hoped with better intentions.

  It was a new day, and I really wanted to begin a new life. I was safe from my captor. I was far away. More than that, I’d gotten away from him. I still didn’t remember the exact way I got out of that van, but I hoped it was something good, something that might have hurt that evil man even more than my rejection had. Maybe it would come to me.

  However, there was something trying to edge its way into my thoughts.

  What was it? Was it those moments I’d escaped?

  I was going to have to close my eyes and think hard about it. I didn’t really want to, but I was compelled to.

  I took a deep breath and closed my eyes as my thoughts went back to the visions I’d seen yesterday when all hell had broken loose at the Rafferty cabin. This time, it was as if my memory could skim over things. I didn’t feel them quite so much. It seemed too fast, though; I was going to miss something important.

  But, no, the subconscious doesn’t work that way. If it wants you to remember something, it won’t skim over it. It will stop right where it needs to stop and show you what it wants to show you. Well, that’s what it did this time.

  And there it was.

  I was in the van again, looking at the pink blanket and the envelope. Those things had let me focus on something other than Levi. That envelope was one he’d picked up from someone’s tardy mail run, when he’d been looking for money or credit cards he knew how to activate and use.

  That envelope had been addressed to Levi Brooks.

  My eyes popped open in the here and now. Oh, no, my kidnapper’s name wasn’t Levi Brooks. I’d been so sure it was because that was the name that had stuck with me, the only thing that had been so clear. But, Levi Brooks hadn’t kidnapped me. In a way, he’d saved me.

  Oh no. Oh, fucking no, Mill would say.

  I picked up the phone again, this time with shaky fingers to call Detective Majors, but it started vibrating in my hand before I could hit send. I recognized the number as Gril’s.

  “Gril?” I answered.

  “Beth, I need your help. We’ve had … there’s no way to talk around this, but we’ve had a body come ashore. I need you to come as soon as possible and help me with … some things. I’m sorry. Donner is on his way to pick you up.”

  I nodded, but didn’t say anything as I hung up the phone.

  I’d have to call Detective Majors later.

  ALSO BY PAIGE SHELTON

  SCOTTISH BOOKSHOP MYSTERY SERIES

  The Cracked Spine

  Of Books and Bagpipes

  A Christmas Tartan (a mini-mystery)

  Lost Books and Old Bones

  The Loch Ness Papers

  COUNTRY COOKING SCHOOL MYSTERY SERIES

  If Fried Chicken Could Fly

  If Mashed Potatoes Could Dance

  If Bread Could Rise to the Occasion

  If Catfish Had Nine Lives

  If Onions Could Spring Leeks

  FARMERS’ MARKET MYSTERY SERIES

  Farm Fresh Murder

  Fruit of All Evil

  Crops and Robbers

  A Killer Maize

  Red Hot Deadly Peppers (a mini-mystery)

  Merry Market Murder

  Bushel Full of Murder

  DANGEROUS TYPE MYSTERY SERIES

  To Helvetica and Back

  Bookman Dead Style

  Comic Sans Murder

  About the Author

  PAIGE SHELTON had a nomadic childhood, as her father’s job as a football coach took her family to seven different towns before she was even twelve years old. After college at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, she moved to Salt Lake City. She thought she’d only stay a couple of years, but instead she fell in love with the mountains and a great guy who became her husband. After many decades in Utah, she and her family moved to Arizona. She writes the Scottish Bookshop Mystery series, which begins with The Cracked Spine. Her other series include the Farmers’ Market, Cooking School, and A Dangerous Type mysteries. Find out more at paigeshelton.com, or sign up for email updates here.

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  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven
<
br />   Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Thirty-Four

  Thirty-Five

  Thirty-Six

  Thirty-Seven

  Also by Paige Shelton

  About the Author

  Copyright

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  First published in the United States by Minotaur Books, an imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group

  THIN ICE. Copyright © 2019 by Paige Shelton-Ferrell. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Publishing Group, 120 Broadway, New York, NY 10271.

  www.minotaurbooks.com

  Cover design by Jonathan Bush

  Cover photographs: snow © Ievgenii Meyer/Shutterstock.com; town © Toni Hoffmann/ Getty Images; mountains © Vicki Jauron, Babylon and Beyond Photography/ Getty images; snow © Dataichi Simon Dubreuil/Getty Images

  The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

  ISBN 978-1-250-29521-7 (hardcover)

  ISBN 978-1-250-29522-4 (ebook)

  eISBN 9781250295224

  Our ebooks may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or by email at [email protected].

  First Edition: December 2019